Society

On a day full of carefully choreographed events to announce incremental progress on thorny political and economic issues in the U.S.-China relationship, one big diplomatic issue has been put to rest: the pandas can stay at the National Zoo.

Mei Xiang and Tian Tian have been at the National Zoo in Washington, D.C., for 10 years. And with today’s agreement, they can stay for another five, Secretary-General of the China Wildlife Conservation Association Zang Chunlin announced.

The current agreement officially expired in December, but an extension of the pair’s stay was expected. There is an official signing ceremony of the extended research agreement scheduled for Thursday morning at the National Zoo.

Chinese pandas and their offspring always belong to China and must be returned eventually. Mei Xiang and Tian TIan have a son, Tai Shan, who was returned to China last year.

Pandas have been an important symbol in U.S.-China relations since Chairman Mao Zedong gave President Richard Nixon two pandas to celebrate his visit to China in 1972.

U.S. President Barack Obama and Chinese President Hu Jintao, seeking a steadier footing for the often-troubled U.S.-China relationship, played up the two nations' common interests—and soft-pedaled or ignored longstanding issues that divide them.

Their uneasy balance—neither friend nor foe—is emerging as the operating principle behind the globe's most critical bilateral relationship. In a one-hour press conference in the White House's East Room, the two leaders sought to demonstrate they can live with areas of tension, even if they can't cure them, including China's currency policy, its human-rights record and the nuclear ambitions of North Korea.

In private sessions, senior administration officials said, the two leaders addressed some of the countries' friction points: They spent about half their time discussing economic issues, and the rest on Iran, North Korea, human rights and other areas, aides said. President Obama's aides said that he pressed Mr. Hu more gently than Congressional critics did on letting China's currency rise, noting it has gradually risen 3.5%, and more if inflation is accounted for. "But he said that China needs to do more, needs to move faster," said a senior aide.

Police in central China's Henan Province say they have apprehended an official who has been been on the run for eight months after facing allegations of corruption.

Li Weimin, 54, former vice secretary of the Anyang Municipal Committee of the Communist Party of China (CPC), disappeared in May last year, a spokesman for the Public Security Bureau of Anyang, Henan Province, said Wednesday.

Police apprehended Li on Monday in Sanmenxia, another city in Henan, the spokesman said, but he gave no further details about the detention.

Li's disappearance made headlines in Chinese media last year. He was expelled from the CPC in June for being suspected of having committed a count of crime known as "taking advantage of his position."

Although local authorities have given no details of his crime, media reports have linked him with a string of corruption cases revealed last year in Sanmenxia, where Li worked as a senior CPC and government official from 1998 to 2009.

According to the Shenzhen traffic management department, the total number of cars in Shenzhen reached 1.7 million on December 8th, 2010. Shenzhen has become the number one city in China with high car density. The Shenzhen traffic management department estimates that Shenzhen’s maximum volume of motor vehicles will be 2.1 million according to the present number of roads in the city. That is to say that it is estimated that Shenzhen’s car number will reach its limitation in the next two years and it will be very difficult to drive.